> ## Content Index
> Fetch the complete content index at: https://poetry101.love/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further.

# Siren Song
- URL: https://poetry101.love/siren-song/
- Published: 2020-11-21T15:22:00.000Z
- Updated: 2020-12-15T06:37:07.000Z
- Description: By Margaret Atwood
- Author: Melissa Anderson
- Tags: Margaret Atwood, Morning Memory, Re-mything, #Import 2026-11-04 19:11

This is the one song everyone  
would like to learn: the song  
that is irresistible:

the song that forces men  
to leap overboard in squadrons  
even though they see the beached skulls

the song nobody knows  
because anyone who has heard it  
is dead, and the others can't remember.

Shall I tell you the secret  
and if I do, will you get me  
out of this bird suit?

I don't enjoy it here  
squatting on this island  
looking picturesque and mythical

with these two feathery maniacs,  
I don't enjoy singing  
this trio, fatal and valuable.

I will tell the secret to you,  
to you, only to you.  
Come closer. This song

is a cry for help: Help me!  
Only you, only you can,  
you are unique

at last. Alas  
it is a boring song  
but it works every time.

Atwood, Margaret. [Selected Poems : 1965-1975](https://www.google.com/books/edition/Selected%5FPoems%5F1965%5F1975/Vv2dfKp74sAC?hl=en&gbpv=0&kptab=getbook&ref=poetry101.love). United Kingdom, Houghton Mifflin, 1987.

Your browser does not support the audio element. 

### Why I chose this poem

As I started this project, I realized I already knew almost all this poem, by heart, by accident, from my first college poetry class when I was 17\. I don't know if I love it as well as I did then. I'm getting less cynical in my old age, but I still love the girl who loved it.